President Donald Trump is preparing to welcome Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Monday in what officials describe as a historic step toward testing whether Damascus can be drawn back into diplomacy after years of war and isolation.

The high-profile meeting underscores a new chapter in U.S.–Syria relations after more than a decade of hostility. A senior administration official told Fox News Digital the visit will focus on counterterrorism cooperation, economic development, and advancing regional peace and security. 

During the visit, the official said, “Syria will announce that it is joining the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS. Syria will thus become the 90th member of the D-ISIS Coalition, partnering with the United States to eliminate ISIS remnants and halt foreign fighter flows.”

The visit follows a week of major policy shifts. On Thursday, the U.N. Security Council voted 14-0, with China abstaining, to remove sanctions on al-Sharaa and Syria’s interior minister. Additionally, Reuters reported that al-Sharaa and his interior minister, Anas Khattab, had formerly been subject to financial sanctions targeted at al Qaeda and ISIS, with the United States designating them Specially Designated Global Terrorists.

SYRIA’S INTERIM PRESIDENT AL-SHARAA EXPECTED TO MEET WITH TRUMP IN FIRST VISIT BY SYRIAN LEADER TO WHITE HOUSE

The meeting comes about six weeks after al-Sharaa — the former commander of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, once affiliated with al Qaeda — addressed the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 24, the first by a Syrian head of state in six decades. There, he urged the West to lift sanctions and called for international support to rebuild the country.

According to the administration official, that is about to happen: “Treasury, State, and Commerce will jointly announce measures taken to lift economic restrictions and provide compliance clarity for investors. The United States will allow Syria to resume operations at its Embassy in Washington to further counterterrorism, security, and economic coordination.”

Syrian officials are seeking a reassessment of the Caesar Act sanctions, the main U.S. law still restricting commercial ties with Damascus. 

The senior administration official told Fox News Digital, “The Administration is issuing a 180-day suspension of the Caesar Act and is urging Congress to permanently repeal the Act to unlock economic growth. The Trump Administration supports the full repeal of the Caesar Act. This is in line with the President’s announcement on cessation of sanctions. Removal is key to allowing U.S. business and regional states to operate in Syria.”

EVANGELICAL LEADER SAYS US MUST PROTECT SYRIAN CHRISTIANS FROM ATTACKS BY JIHADI TERRORISTS

Rep. Abe Hamadeh, R-Ariz., who visited Damascus this summer, told Fox News Digital he views the visit as an opportunity to end years of bloodshed.

“This is the first chance Syria has to emerge from decades of brutal oppression and more than a decade of civil war,” the congressman said. “I went to Damascus to make sure missing Americans like Kayla Mueller are not forgotten, to advocate for expanding the Abraham Accords, and to remind Syria’s new leaders that they must include minorities like the Druze, Christians, and Kurds and protect their rights.”

On Friday, about 100 influential Christian leaders sent a letter to President Trump calling on him to raise the issue of minority rights and protection with the Syrian leader. The letter was led by Dede Laugesen, president of Save the Persecuted Christians, and included Ralph Reed, Tony Perkins, Samuel Rodriguez, Rob McCoy and Alveda King.

In it, they thanked Trump for his efforts in protecting Christians and also asked him to bring up the issue with al-Sharaa. “We urge you to address directly the massacre of Christians, Kurds, Druze, and Alawites in Syria, notably in the greater Suwayda area. These religious minorities face ongoing violence, death, displacement, starvation, and water and medical deprivation—all while innocent women and children are held hostage by ISIS terrorists.”

“Mr. President, we respectfully request that you secure President al-Sharaa’s commitment to opening a secure humanitarian corridor from Hader to Suwayda in southern Syria. This corridor will enable safe and secure aid delivery and civilian evacuation, signaling the new government’s commitment to minority rights and stability,” the letter stated.

SYRIA’S NEW PRESIDENT TAKES CENTER STAGE AT UNGA AS CONCERNS LINGER OVER TERRORIST PAST

Ahmad Sharawi of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies told Fox News Digital that Washington hopes to use the meeting to pursue stability and contain Iran’s influence.

“The U.S. interest is having a government that is willing to fight ISIS and stop Iran from re-emerging,” he said. “I think the U.S. will try to find a solution to the Kurdish issue in northeast Syria and build a unified country with no decentralization or federalism.”

He cautioned that al-Sharaa’s domestic record shows “a political system that is not inclusive” and a pattern of power centralization. Despite those concerns, he added, many Syrians see him as “the only figure capable of holding the country together.”

In October, al-Sharaa traveled to Russia to meet with President Vladimir Putin — a move Sharawi said highlights both pragmatism and risk.

“One would think that 11 months ago, when the Russians were air-striking Idlib and al-Sharaa’s forces, we wouldn’t see al-Sharaa meeting with Putin in Moscow,” Sharawi said. “But it’s a clear indicator of how al-Sharaa operates — focused on securing his interests but also being pragmatic.”

He added that the outreach signals to the West that “if you don’t give me what I want, I have other countries I can lean on,” and said it’s an effort to secure weapons and political backing after years of war and loss of equipment.

SYRIAN PRESIDENT’S HISTORIC UN SPEECH JOINED BY THOUSANDS RALLYING OUTSIDE FOR PEACE AND TRUMP’S SUPPORT

“That’s why I asked CENTCOM’s Gen. Michael Kurilla during House Armed Services Committee hearings about these opportunities and risks — and wrote the NDAA section on assessing the feasibility of defense partnerships with the new Syrian government,” Hamadeh said. “We must ensure that ISIS and Iran never return and make sure the Russians and Chinese are kept at a distance.”

Syrian-American activist Hicham Alnchawati of the Syria Freedom Path organization told Fox News Digital that Syrians largely welcome the visit.

“They’re looking for a better future,” he said. “They suffered the war — there’s no water, no food, no economy, and no security. He knows his interest is with the U.S. He’s coming here to achieve mutual interests for both the U.S. and Syria.”

Alnchawati argued that lasting stability will require eliminating Iran’s and Hezbollah’s influence.

“If you really want stability in the Middle East, you have to finish the job with Hezbollah and the Iranians,” he said. “They have to be totally dismantled. Otherwise, they’ll reignite the conflict one more time.”

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The United Nations and U.S. sanctions decisions have sparked debate in Washington and Europe. Reuters and the Associated Press reported that some lawmakers and rights groups argue that legitimizing a former jihadist commander could undercut accountability for past abuses, while supporters say the relief offers Damascus an incentive to cooperate on counterterrorism and drug control.

Sharawi told Fox News Digital the policy to bid on al-Sharaa “gives Damascus a powerful incentive but leaves Washington exposed. The political cost of failure would be enormous.”

Misleading posts circulating on X claim that an appeal lodged by French far-right leader Marine Le Pen against a conviction barring her from running in the 2027 presidential election has been rejected.

In March, Judge Bénédicte de Perthuis sentenced Le Pen to a five-year ban on holding public office, effective immediately, after finding she was “at the heart” of a scheme to embezzle European parliamentary funds.

The Paris Criminal Court also handed down a four-year prison sentence — two years suspended and two to be served with an electronic bracelet — along with a €100,000 fine. Le Pen has described the verdict as a “political witch-hunt” and declared she would exhaust all legal avenues to overturn it.

One widely shared post, which has amassed more than 600,000 views, claims that her appeal has already been denied, that the “French people are outraged”, and that the “EU is behind” the rejection.

But where does Le Pen actually stand, and do any of the post’s claims hold weight?

Has Le Pen’s appeal been rejected?

Essentially, to try and overturn her presidential ban as quickly as possible, Le Pen launched two separate challenges along French administrative and criminal paths.

On 15 October, the Council of State — France’s highest administrative court — rejected a legal challenge made by Le Pen against the country’s electoral rules.

It’s this administrative challenge that the post is likely referring to. As it happened weeks ago, it’s not breaking news, and it’s also separate from the appeal against her criminal conviction, which hasn’t been heard yet.

The administrative challenge concerned Le Pen’s removal from the electoral list in the Pas-de-Calais department, where she is an MP.

“Since she’s hit a wall in the criminal courts, Le Pen tried a side route: taking her case to the administrative courts,” Camille Aynès, constitutional law expert at the University of Paris Nanterre, told The Cube.

“Why go that way? Not really to win back her council seat. The real goal was strategic — to create a case that would allow her to raise a ‘priority question of constitutionality’ (QPC),” she said. “That’s a special French mechanism allowing someone in a lawsuit to ask whether the law applied in their case violates the Constitution.”

Ultimately, the Council of State refused to pass her challenge along. The criminal provisions that Le Pen contested, according to the court, were either non-existent or unrelated.

“The criminal provisions she was challenging weren’t even applicable in this administrative dispute,” Aynès told The Cube. “In other words, this wasn’t a backdoor appeal of her criminal conviction.”

The main impact of the Council of State court’s rejection is that Le Pen lost an opportunity to have the issue reviewed quickly, instead of waiting months for her appeal trial.

It’s an issue that she will have wanted to resolve quickly amid the political unrest in France — if President Emmanuel Macron called snap presidential elections, they could take place before Le Pen’s criminal appeal ruling, leaving her unable to run, whatever the subsequent result is.

Appeals yet to come

Despite claims made by online users that her appeal has been denied, Le Pen is launching a separate and larger appeal against her criminal conviction — the outcome of which is far from decided. A trial has been scheduled from 13 January until 12 February next year.

A verdict in this trial is expected before the summer, which would still give Le Pen time to stand in the 2027 presidential election, provided her sentence is overturned or reduced.

“The Council of State still has to rule on another QPC Le Pen filed over her removal as a regional councillor — but experts expect the outcome to be the same: no referral to the Constitutional Council,” Aynès told The Cube.

In July, Le Pen also sought an interim measure from the European Court of Human Rights — a Strasbourg-based court which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights — to quash the immediate application of her five-year ban. Her request was denied.

“At this point, only the criminal appeal can change things,” Aynès said. “If her verdict is upheld, she can then turn to the Court of Cassation [France’s supreme court for civil and criminal cases].”

Is the European Union to blame and how popular is Le Pen?

As for the claims that the “EU is behind” Le Pen’s ban, they’re also wrong: the case and the conviction are entirely under the French judiciary.

The details in the case date back to when Le Pen was an MEP. Prosecutors say that, between 2004 and 2016, she and several of her party members diverted funds meant to pay for parliamentary assistants to finance party activities in France.

According to Aynès, the wrongdoing only stopped because the European Parliament blew the whistle.

“That’s the only sense in which the EU can be said to have been ‘involved’ — it alerted prosecutors,” she said.

Similar narratives conflating the European Union’s role in national courts were repeated on social media after Romanian presidential candidate Călin Georgescu was banned from running in the country’s presidential election by the constitutional court.

Despite her legal woes, Le Pen and the National Rally (RN) party remain popular, so that part of the X post is true. At the time of her conviction, an Ifop Opinion poll placed her at 37%. More recent polling puts her and RN president Jordan Bardella between 33 and 37%, ahead of their political rivals.

Other claims that Bardella will run for her party as a presidential candidate are also unconfirmed, despite the 30-year-old having Le Pen’s vocal backing. RN did not respond to The Cube’s request for comment on the matter as of the time of publishing.

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